Bill Granger “Bill’s Italian Food”

I made this quickly one lunch time for a friend. It was totally delicious but what was a very pleasant surprise, was that I was able to have it as leftovers for several days. Beautiful soft ricotta combined with raw courgette. And the addition of the zested lemon mixed with the chilli was just perfect.

From: “Bill’s Italian Food” – June 2014 (I never got around to posting this during the month, but it seems that this dish has real staying power, given how much we love it.)

Why: We’ve made this twice already and I’ve only had the cookbook since June. He says in the introduction that his daughter would eat this every night, and I think that also would be true of my sons. They love it because of all of the cheesy pasta goodness, I love it because it tastes an awful lot like lasagna, but takes seconds to prepare. (Well, not seconds if we’re being technical, but it’s very, very quick.)

Top Tips: With two hungry boys– one a teenager– we have found that just one 500g bag of gnocchi isn’t enough to feed us all. We double it and then there’s plenty for everyone.

Kirstin: I wasn’t expecting to like this book as much as I do. I know I will be using it lots in the future too. A total gem of a book.

Maureen: I completely agree. I didn’t think this book would be as great as it is. Maybe that’s damning it with faint praise, but everything we ate from it this month worked and was delicious. Total win.

Anna: I didn’t think I was going to have the opportunity to make much from it but I’ve ended up cooking loads and that’s testatament to how good it is. Simple, easy, everyday cooking. Italian cooking too. What’s not love.

Anna: Oh wow! Ok. This is my new favourite salmon dish. And given we have salmon at least once a week, I’ve been through a lot of recipes…

Peter: Yes it is very nice. Not a lot of it though. Where are the carbs?

Anna: There are no carbs. We haven’t been having many carbs recently. I’m surprised you haven’t noticed.

Peter: I have noticed.

Anna: This reminds me of old school Jamie. Jamie when the recipes were simple and worked and not accompanied by a load of waffle. He’d call it “Roasted salmon with pimped up mayo, my way” or something. The only thing I would change is to have more asparagus as it did shrink a lot when it was cooked. Yummy asparagus crisps. Yummy!

Peter: This vegetarian dish greatly benefits from the addition of sausage meat.

Anna: Not a grain of rice in sight! It’s all sausage with a couple of tomatoes and some yummy herbs mixed in. I liked the torn bread that you stick in at the end to soak up all the juices.

Peter: It was surprisingly filling. What’s not to like?

Anna: I appreciated the fact that they were really quick to prepare. I could do them ahead of time and leave you to stick them in the oven while I went for a run. For that reason we’ll be having them again, for sure.

Peter: I should have stuck to Bill’s recipe and only used the strong white bread flour rather than combining it with the ’00’ I’m trying to use up.

Anna: It all went a bit wrong didn’t it?

Peter: It just got too sticky. Which is why I should have followed the recipe. This one, in contrast to other recipes, uses honey to feed the yeast rather than sugar. Could you taste it in the dough, Wife?

Anna: I could actually. It was definitely sweeter than normal. I’m not sure if I’m that keen.

Peter: The quantities are a bit dubious. There’s not as much flour as there usually is. It’s supposed to be a recipe for four but we only got 3 pizzas out of it.

Anna: So will you use this recipe again?

Peter: I’ll give it a go with the right flour. But the recipe from Jamie’s Italy still gets my vote for now.